Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1887-05-20

before leaving tnlS SUBJECT, | peg 10
say that there are other insuperable OBJ
~jections to the theory that the w. Ii. Bal
com mare was the dam of Ethan:
LIST. The Balcom mare was hipped
and the dam of Ethan was not.
| believe the idea that the dam of Eth
an was hipped rests upon statements to
that effect by b. G. Woodland and Mrs.
w. II. Cook. What Mr.. Woodard's OPP
%portunities for knowing were | am not
informed. but he evidently mistook the
peculiar carriage resulting from SPAWN
for the lowering of a hip. As to Mrs.
Cook, | myself tool her statement. | re-
member she said the mare twas hipped,
| think that is what they called it," of
course the lady's idea of what the mares
u~nsoundness consisted of was very liable
to be mistaken. Joshua Holcomb also
thought she was hipped. On the other
hand, AFRO VI. Bailey of IT,, a lifelong
handler of horses, who drove the mare
in the winter of lS41-2, and found her
'as good a road mare as he ever Drove"
and who knew her well after Holcomb
got her; w. G. Baldwin of IL, II gentle
man of high intelligence and one of the
bestof horsemen; William Arthur of IL,
noted for keen observation and retentive
memory Ira Potter, who drove her in
the team when the Cooks owned her. and
John \. Pinchin of III, the blacksmith
who shod the mare many times and knew
her perfectly, all agree that she was spav-
ined and not hipped. That seems suffi-
Gent to settle the point.
ID. G. VI. Balloon, who made it his
home at w. II. Balcom's for some years
up to the time of the latter's going West,
in 1913, states positively that he knew
both the W. II. Balloon mare and the
mare that Rufus Rising had that passed
into the hands of Warner Cook. and that
they were different mares. He knew the
Cook mare when she was in the hands
of Rufus Rising and when she was in
the hands of the Cooks. and states posi-
lively that W. II. Balloon never owned
her. He say that the Balcom mare.
when given away to Wallace. twas old.
hipped and very lame" which seems eX-
tremely probable from the fact of her
having been given away by II poor farm
er in Hague: and he adds that he knows
she was dead before Ethan Allen was
foaled, which, as he remained about
Hague till 1915, he might well have
known. This statement is certainly of
as much value as that of the extremely
aged Joseph Cushman. who states that he
knows that Ira Wallace traded such a
gray mare to Warner Cook: and who.
when asked to fix the date accurately.
puts it "about 1850"
3D.. The very significant circumstance
that, in all the testimony that has been
taken, no hint has ever crept out that the
dam of Ethan while in the hands of the
Cooks or later was ever referred to a
thc BdicOm murc. or as Il mare that W.
ii. Balloon had ever owned nor yet as
the Wallace mare, or mare bought of Ira
Wallace. On the other hand. \. VI. Bal
ley "A Y that W. III. and W. V. Cook al
ways called her the johnson mare. and
Ira Potter and others say she was called
the Rising mare; showing that she was
designated, as is almost always the case.
by the name of the person of whom she
was purchased, or that of IA former own
er. Not one of the persons connect
ed with Warner Cook or immediately
knowing to his having this mare at the
time ever suspected that she had been
owned by W. II. Balloon. \. NJ. Bailey.
lIoyt Johnson. y. W. Moon, Justus b.
Rising, Ira Potter, G. NJ. Balloon. John
a. Pinchin, Mrs. w. ii. Cook, W. G.
Baldwin. and every one else who knew
about the matter personally, or had
learned from the parties themselves, un-
derstood that the mare passed from Ru-
fus Rising through the hands of Geo.
johnson to Warner Cook. Not one OF
them ever heard of w. ii. Balcom's mare
in that connection.
It'll. 1t has always seemed to me little
short of miraculous that this old, badly.
hipped, lame, worthless, b%roken-dowr
brood mare, that so poor a man as w. III
Balcom then was could afford to give
away, evidently because she was not
worth keeping, and that the recipient
should trade off at once for a little corr
(variously stated as two and as tifteer
bushels) that such IA mare as this should
appear in the winter of ls41-2 a.
described by AFRO NJ. Bailey, wher
he drove her a long journey. Her,
is what he says; "She was a screamel
on the road. | once drove her to Wey.
bridge by the side of a chestnut mare.
never drove a better team think this wa,
in 1912. She was sound think she hat
had one colt. = \ = She was as fine {
roader as you ever sat behind-ambi
tious, full of vim all day long" (Mr